Everyone has their own belief as to what is the correct and true belief concerning god...most posts revolve around this...

If we can leave the "what god is (or isn't), or what the true religion is (or isn't)" out of this post and just discuss the why..

Why have many people over many generations concerned themselves with religion and god ??, We all can answer fairly simply why mankind seeks food and shelter etc..., but why have many spent so much time on religion.

I have a few thoughts about this to start this thread...
We learn about our gods within our society..Zeus,Jesus etc...
And people believe what they are exposed to, or chose not to...
but why ??
Is it simply that many are just following a social custom within their community ?? Is it a need for comfort and answers about the unknown...death,earthquakes, sunrise and sunset etc... Is it mainly fear ?? if we don't sacrifice a virgin or say our hail Mary's we will burn for eternity in a bad place??

I sincerely request that we all try to keep to why, not what and we all try to leave out our personal beliefs as to what. Thanks, ed :)

Why? Simple, I love watching people go on rants!!!

Thank you Ed, for starting an extremely interesting and refreshingly different type of topic. I'll be looking forward to reading the replies here, although I can already see by some of the responses that your question is already being misunderstood by some people.

I would like to respond to some of your question specifically.



I think there are many different answers to this question.

If we merely look around today we can see individual humans viewing religions (or spirituality) from entirely different perspectives.

Some are seeking something personal for themselves. Others are hard-up to push their religious views onto society as a whole as a means of controlling the behavior of others.

I think religions in general have been motivated throughout history by both of these vantage points.

Some religions have become extremely dogmatic with their "God" representing the ultimate dictator and authority. Who can question such a total authority as the very creator of everything that exists. It's the epitome of a "Power Trip" to be part of such a religion.

However, there are spiritual people who prefer to be extremely meek and quiet in their spiritual practices and get something entirely different from the experience. Obviously not a "power trip".



I believe that this may indeed be true for many people. However, I have personally always felt that life is "magical", "mystical", or "spiritual" if you well. From an extremely young age, even before I was truly able to grasp any social idea of any "gods", even at that time I felt that I was in the presence of a divine 'higher power'.

Of course, as I've grown to consider these concepts more intellectually I fully understand secular notions that what I am actually experiencing is my own consciousness, and nothing more.

That may or may not be true, I cannot say. I only know that there has never been a time in my life when I have felt alone, or unsafe, and the thought of death does not bother me in the least because I have always "innately known intuitively" that I'm eternal.

Is that innate intuitively knowledge truth? I can't say, all I can say is that it's my intuition. Whether it's true or not is basically a moot point really.



That has never been true for me. I have never felt any need to do anything for the mere sake of pleasing someone else's beliefs or expectations.

But I do know that many humans are apparently driven by a need to "fit in". In fact, I'm told that people who feel like me are quite unique in terms of the masses.



Atheism does not frighten me. If atheism is true it's no big deal for me. Other than I do confess that I feel that such a situation is rather mundane and seems like a total waste of time from my perspective.



I never had a reason to believe in demonic gods. The "higher presence" I was so close to as a child was total love, there was nothing demonic about it. I still feel that if there is a spiritual essence to life it's totally divine, and not demonic at all.



Why do I continue to "believe" that there is a spiritual essence to life? Well, as I've said, I've always innately felt this to be the case.

However, having said that, I ultimately confess to being 'agnostic' (without absolute knowledge beyond those innate intuitions). And as atheists have rightfully pointed out, intuition could be wrong.

So in a sense you could say that I intuitively believe in a spiritual essence of life and that I am eternal. However, intellectually I must be honest and confess that technically I can only say that I believe in the possibility of a spiritual essence to life.

It is important to me one way or the other?

Not really. If atheism is true I'll never know it. Thus atheism is certainly nothing to fear. If spirituality is true I feel confident that it is indeed as divine as I intuitively feel that it is. And finally, if my intuition is wrong and demonic godheads exists, I wouldn't even want to know about it until I was face-to-face with them. Then I would deal with that hellish nightmare simply because I would have no other choice at that time.

Ed, my previous post was basically a personal response. Basically "my reasons" for why I tend to believe in a spiritual existence over a non-spiritual one.

However, I think in terms of humans in general probably the single greatest reason for wanting to believe in a God is precisely for the purpose of having comfort that "Justice will be done".

People feel better if they think their oppressors will ultimately pay for their crimes against the oppressed ones.

Otherwise life would be so 'unfair' and people have a hard time dealing with that.

Also, I think it's no so much a personal fear of death, but more along the lines of wanting to believe that deceased loved one's are actually preserved in some way and we'll be able to be with them again somehow. The idea that they actually ceased to exist forever and will never be again, is a very difficult thing for people to accept. Especially if the loved one in question died young or in the prime of life and were showing much enthusiasm about life. It's so much easier to envision them going on to something even BETTER rather than considering that they actually ceased to exist altogether.

That's a really hard concept for most people to accept, especially when it comes to someone they truly love deeply.

Atheism seems extremely cold and callous to many people. And to readily embrace atheism without giving the mysticism of spirituality at least the benefit of the doubt seems to be a cold and callous attitude.

How can someone so readily accept atheism when the very idea of mystical spirituality exists in the human imagination?

It it exists there, then perhaps it can exist elsewhere as an actual reality. That's enough to give most people HOPE.

If you can believe in something then maybe it can actually be true.

Why give up on a dream?

Isn't life all about making dreams come true?

Everyone loves a great fairy tale where it ends, "And they lived happily ever after". For reality to be such a fairy tale would be the ultimate dream.

So why not dream?

To not dream is basically mundane.

Even if I knew beyond any shadow of a doubt that atheism is true and that when I die I will just black out and cease to exist, I would STILL dream of greater things. Why let reality keep you from dreaming?

Dreaming is a great reality in and of itself.

Thank you for the previous post :)
I think it touched upon the most common reasons why many people believe in religions......
There is comfort in believing that our loved ones will live forever in a nice place, that justice will be done (this could be a huge discussion in and of itself... justice as defined by whom ??, and having comfort within our own imaginations....

And the most profound explanation was..
"Dreaming is a great reality in and of itself."